My experience of Tinder is as follows: Swipe left, swipe left, swipe left, swipe left. Ooh! He likes Kate Bush/James Joyce/The ‘Gatsby should have put a ring on it’ Facebook page. I bet we’re soul mates. It’s only a matter of time before we elope to Gibraltar and open up a book shop-cum-restaurant in a cave overlooking the sea. And in the evenings we’ll swim naked in the faintly glimmering waters before retiring for a night of quiet, forceful love-making.

Or something similar.

Of course, this impression is mediated by the all-important portfolio of Tinder profile pictures. But profile picture etiquette is now a saturated field of enquiry, and I would like to delve instead into something a little more unclear but nevertheless still important: the Shared Interest.

The most immediate problem with the Shared Interest is that nobody has ‘liked’ anything since 2009. So we are all effectively judging potential partners based on our 16-year-old selves. You find bizarre interests – like Ant & Dec fan-fiction or roller blading – which would be utterly off-putting if you didn’t take a moment to exercise a little reason. And on the other side of the scale are the completely ubiquitous entries: Lady Gaga, Florence and the Machine, FACEBOOK ITSELF – the kind of entries which, if your prospective match did not share them, may lead you to think he might be some sort of criminally insane social recluse.

There comes a point in all this anachronistic judgement when the penny drops – these interests are shared. I too represent myself in a mixture of blasé and ridiculous interests which no longer reflect my character, and which in fact actively embarrass me. Unlike the hallowed profile picture, the shrine of self-curation around which our entire cyber-personae are constructed, the Shared Interest is left sadly at the bottom of the page to cause pain, embarrassment, and the occasional feeling of deep obsession.

But that occasional feeling of obsession is important, too. Regardless of whether this person actually likes the thing they ‘like’, the Shared Interest contains the idea of the possibility of a connection. When coupled with the profile picture where he’s wearing the perfect chunky knit or just the right shaved side to tousled top ratio (I make no apologies for my taste in men), that interest gives you something to latch on to. And the important combination of looks and interests explains the origins of Tinder’s name: like the first time you see someone walking across the college court, or wearing an ironic but still wildly attractive bop costume, Tinder gives you just enough information to create a fantasy.

The Shared Interest doesn’t necessarily have to be capitalised, or referring to Tinder. Let’s say you’re having a college family night, and your father/mother/sister/brother has caught your attention. Ignoring deep, tragic feelings of incestuous guilt, you strike up a conversation that goes a bit like this:

Son: I’ve never had anything stronger than a WKD but I really don’t think this is getting me drunk.
Mum: That’s funny, I thought the same thing when I was travelling in Nepal and my host family gave me some of the local brew to try.
Son: OH MY GOD YOU’VE BEEN TO NEPAL NAMASTE.
Mum: OH MY GOD NO WAY DID YOU FIND YOURSELF IN THE MISTY GLADES?

The conversation continues until Oedipal travesty occurs. In the sobering light of day the magic has died. From now on you sit at different brunch tables.

There are a couple of different ways to think about this: either, good for you! You shamelessly exploited a niche mutual interest to earn some freshers’ week infamy. Or, sorry pet, you foolishly believed that this was indicative of a deep spiritual connection. Give your heart time to heal.

The question at the root of this is: how does an interest actually reflect someone’s character? For my part, I’d say there is a vague correlation: someone who likes Kate Bush and James Joyce is more likely to be interesting, eccentric and endearingly geekish. But that’s only because I (somewhat wilfully) choose to associate those people with those characteristics. Someone who likes Kate Bush and James Joyce could easily also be irritating, arrogant and exhausting – and of course they could possess characteristics which I do not associate with my two favourite people. So the Shared Interest, if it is attractive, is a lie that we gladly accept – an unreality upon which we can build the greater unreality of the ‘obsessive infatuation’ kind.

All of this could come across as a needless continuation of the ‘don’t judge a book by its cover’ argument. But the reality of the situation is that most communication now takes place across platforms that force us to do just that. So instead of crying into our tea-cosies and praying for the authenticity revival, we should continue Tindering with aplomb – and cynicism. Those six photographs, the 100-word bio and the Shared Interests represent just one of the ways that people in 2014 can represent themselves. And representation is exactly what you’re dealing with when you get to know someone in any circumstances. So walk into the light of perfectly filtered selfies; go boldly towards lightly intellectual South American fiction; and stay away from men draped over heavily anaesthetised tigers.

And if you like Kate Bush or James Joyce, message me.